A report released by WalletHub, a personal finance site with consumer credit and bank tools, has ranked Nevada dead last in health care for children. This is even less than Mississippi.
Their analysis compared all 50 states, and the District of Columbia using 28 different metrics including overall health, infant and child mortality rates, number of vaccinated children, cost health care and other factors. They calculated the overall scores for each state and the District of Columbia based on its weighted average across all metrics and used the resulting scores to construct our final ranking.
“We have a shortage of physicians and health care providers. In our medical school, it only has 230 kids in a class, in school. That’s 60 kids a year,” said Chief Operating Officer Brian Branman, University Medical Center.
Branman adds that most physicians stay in the community where they get their specialized training. But in Nevada, there aren’t many training programs for neurology, gastroenterology or cardiology. UMC says that leads to a drain of medical talent from the state.
“The real worry is the children. We’re seeing a vast increase in Type 2 diabetes, the adult onset type in the younger kids, particularly teenagers,” said Dr. Fred Toffel, Diabetes Treatment Center.
Not only are children not exercising enough, but there aren’t enough endocrinologists to treat those with diabetes in Nevada. Dr. Toffel says many of his patients can’t afford diabetes medication anymore.
Nevada was less than half as good as the top ranked state, Vermont.
The top 5 states are:
1. Vermont
2. Massachusetts
3. Connecticut
4. Iowa
5. New Hampshire
The bottom 5 states are:
47. Texas
48. Alaska
49. Arizona
50. Mississippi
51. Nevada
